The Unconscious
Freud used the analogy of an iceberg to describe our conscious and subconscious/preconscious/nonconscious/unconscious mind. In this analogy, our conscious mind is above the water, whilst below the waterline is material in our mind that is outside of our awareness. The proportion of our mind below the waterline is significantly greater, and potentially more powerful, than that which sits above.
Some of the things below the waterline might be just outside of awareness and, with some effort can enter awareness with relative ease (preconscious). Whereas other content lying in the depths of our mind can be much harder to access (unconscious). However, even this mental material bubbles up to the surface, for example, in our dreams, psychosomatic complaints or reactive behaviours.
We cannot attend to everything within our environment. If we were to fully process all of the stimuli we would become exhausted and overwhelmed, we would struggle to get through our daily life. To cope with this our brains can partially process stimuli, quickly making sense of an experience through our associative brain, a kind of short-cut or mental lifehack.
Some other things within our unconscious exist in an unprocessed state, such as memories that were too difficult to fully experience and process at the time they originally occurred, for example, non-verbal or traumatic memories.
Other things residing within the unconscious are the implicit messages taken in from the adults in our childhood, messages about our self-worth, and how we ‘should’ behave. Hence, our unconscious informs our thoughts, feeling and behaviours through partial information, associations, quick judgements, implicit teachings and body memories. These things drive our thoughts, feelings and behaviours, yet remain outside of our conscious awareness.
The Shadow
The Shadow refers to the contents of our mind that we cannot see so clearly. The concept refers to elements that lie within our unconscious mind.
Wellbeing requires insight into our thoughts, feelings and behaviours. These, along with “our bodies, relationships, history and culture all need to be seen, heard, respected, and made part of the whole. Our (parents’) unintegrated and unconscious anger at their (parents) is passed on to us in many forms. Our teachers’ attachment issues become the foundation of classroom culture. Our therapists’ unresolved trauma contribute to the challenges and limitations of our therapeutic work.” - Louis Cozolino.
Embodied mind
Our past experiences shape our nervous/threat system, which shapes our thoughts, feelings and behaviours in a myriad of ways. Typically, many of the words and perceptual experiences of our past reside outside of our awareness, yet actively live in our unconscious.
“(The Polyvagal Theory suggests that) the underlying physiological state functionally drives the personal narrative. It creates the neural platform upon which higher brain structures are then recruited” – Stephen Porges
“(People who have experienced trauma) cannot recover until they become familiar with and befriend the sensations in their bodies” - Bessel van der Kolk
Storied world
We live in a storied world. Throughout childhood stories are given to us, stories of who we are and who we will become. These stories live within us, shaping us at an unconscious embodied level, perhaps as a sense rather than a thought. These sensed stories become reinforced as internal scripts that we unconsciously act-out.
“Everything is story” “Story is the basic unit of psychology and medicine, because everything humans do is done in the form of a story or a narrative…in fact, neuroscientists are finding that the default mode of our brain is to tell and recall stories…stories light up more areas of our brain than anything else and in fact when our brain is on idle, when our brain is just resting, what we tend to do is we run stories, simulations… story is the most powerful basic unit of information and in terms of psychology it makes a lot more sense to talk about defective stories than it does to talk about defective people”
Lewis Mehl-Madrona, (2012)
Trauma-sensitive, Trauma-informed
Trauma touches most of us at some point in our lives, some more than others. For every 100 adults in England, 48 have suffered at least one Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) during their childhood and nine have suffered four or more. (Blackburn & Darwen Study). Six ACEs can reduce your life expectancy by 20 years.
A trauma-sensitive approach works to establish safety and stabilisation.
Integrative
A biopsychosocial approach acknowledges the intersecting impact of our physical, psychological, social and environmental experiences and resources. An integrative therapeutic approach draws upon a range of perspectives as required.
Journaling
Journaling is a method to enhance personal development. It is the use of writing (prose, poetry, letter writing, dialoguing) and drawing exercises (using colour, symbols, mark-making, images, found objects). These methods help you access and express subconscious feelings and thoughts, which in turn, helps you to find meaning in your actions, emotions and in your life as a whole. Journaling exercises can help you to identify unhelpful patterns, make clearer, healthier choices and define and implement the change that benefits your wellbeing.
(For ideas and exercises see Lucia Capacchione).
Mindfulness
“Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally,” “It’s about knowing what is on your mind.” Jon Kabat-Zinn.
We can bring mindfulness into our daily activities such as walking, showering/bathing, eating and drinking. As Iain McGilchrist notes “the kind of attention we pay actually alters the world: we are literally partners in creation.” He cautions that we are increasingly paying attention through our left hemisphere, and thus creating an “increasingly mechanistic, fragmented, decontextualised world.” As we rush from A to B we may increasingly lose sight of the world around us. Hence, we have truisms scattered throughout social media reminding us to ‘live in the moment’ or that ‘it’s the journey, not the destination.’
Slowing down brings more time and quality to our lives.
Or as Annie Dillard puts it, "How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives".
Mindfulness as an Attuned Relationship with Oneself – Dan Siegel:
“Although mindfulness is often seen as a form of attentional skill that focuses your mind on the present, the approach of The Mindful Brain takes a deep look at this type of awareness through a perhaps surprising perspective: seeing mindfulness as a form of healthy relationship with oneself. In my own field of studying interpersonal relationships within families, we use the concept of “attunement” to examine how one person, a parent for example, focuses attention on the internal world of another, such as a child or a spouse. This focus on the mind of another person harnesses neural circuitry that enables two people to “feel felt” by each other. This state is crucial for people in relationships to feel vibrant and alive, to feel understood, and to feel at peace. Research has shown that such attuned relationships promote resilience and longevity. Our understanding of mindfulness can build on these studies of interpersonal attunement and the self-regulatory functions of attention in suggesting a new approach: That mindful awareness is a form of intra-personal attunement.”
The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being (New York: WW Norton 2007) Daniel J. Siegel, M.D
A cautionary note, for those who are overwhelmingly stressed and traumatised (see ACE’s above) mindfulness can exacerbate trauma symptoms, emotional arousal, trauma-related cognitions and dissociation. Mindfulness practice requires a trauma-sensitive approach.
Emotional literacy / Emotional Intelligence
Daniel Goleman suggests that Emotional Intelligence consists of Self-awareness, Self-regulation, Empathy, Social skills and Motivation.
All of these qualities underpin resilience. They are developed within an attuned, nurturing relationship, ideally with our primary caregivers and supported by the other adults that shape our childhood such as grandparents, teachers etc.
Empathic Understanding
Empathy has been described as “the capacity to understand and respond to the unique affective experiences of another person” (Decety and Jackson, 2006; p.54). An empathic stance can result in:
a) an effective response to another person
b) a cognitive process of perspective taking
c) emotional regulation (Decety and Jackson, 2006; p.54).
By responding to ourselves, and each other, with empathy, we can attend to the things that we find difficult, distressing, or even shameful. By turning towards these things and attending to them with empathy we can change behavioural patterns and find new ways to experience ourselves, the world, and each other. Empathic understanding towards our self and others is at the heart of wellbeing.
Attuned relationships
We are social beings. “The brain has evolved as a social organ of the body” (Siegel, 2003). Interpersonal connection is fundamental to our very existence, both at the evolutionary level where it is fundamental to our physical survival (Cozolino, 2006), and at the level of the mind where it is fundamental to our psychological wellbeing (Siegel, 2006).
“The experience of a close bond (connection) is a (primary) universal human need” - John Bowlby.
Atunement is an intersubjective connection, a deeply relational experience that creates a sense of being seen, heard and understood and thus a feeling of safety, ‘that all is well’.
“Children need attunement to feel secure and to develop well, and throughout our lives we need attunement to feel close and connected.” - Dan Siegel.
Attunement is an intersubjective experience:
“The concept of intersubjectivity is drawn from existentialism and refers to a communal flow from the depths of oneself to another” - Douglass and Moustakas.
Phenomenologist Merleau-Ponty (1968) described intersubjectivity as a reciprocal intertwining where two people impact upon each other. Dan Siegel (2006) describes it as a state of deep connection in which neural firing in the brain of one person can stimulate similar patterns of neural firing in another creating ‘resonance’ in the other (Siegel, 2006). He states that we are highly receptive to intersubjective communication because it is necessary for emotional regulation and our sense of self. The process is typically a nonconscious process (Lyons-Ruth, 1998) occurring outside of our awareness, and as Daniel Stern (2004) noted, these moments may be mutual and fleeting.
Reparative relationships
“Trauma is a chronic disruption of connection” - Stephen Porges
“recovery can take place only within the context of relationships: it cannot occur in isolation” - Judith Herman
When we engage with one another we enter into a unique relational dynamic between two embodied minds (hearts and minds.)
By developing our reflective awareness, of our thoughts, feelings and behaviours, we can develop our awareness of how we connect to each other and how we shape each other in relationship. This insight will support relational growth and reduce the harm in our relationships as parents, partners, professionals and in all other relational encounters.
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